going for broke
by meatballs in the impala
Summary: Sometimes the fear won't go away, so you'll have to do it afraid. Domestic!AU, the beginning.


**status** complete  
 **background** the beginnings of the domestic!au, in which Jo and Dean are happily married, still (sort of) hunting, and have a boy named Matt.  
 **notice** There is nothing more refreshing than going through your old work and finding almost-finished pieces that you got a kick out of writing in the first place. Bonus points when the object of said work is Dean/Jo, and more specificallty, the Domestic!AU. As one of my favorite theories about how things should have turned out after the Apocalypse, this AU always drags me back to the fandom. I want to give Dean and Jo the happy ending the writers never gave them, and I want to expand on it until I have nothing more to write. So this is how the Domestic!AU begins. Not with a bang, but a whimper — and two very dysfunctional individuals with hearts of gold.

* * *

 **going for broke;  
** _think of the wonderful mess that we'll make._

* * *

Once Jo manages to pull her head out of the toilet long enough to be able to have a civilized conversation, she calls Dean up and sets up a meeting.

Naturally, he tries to bullshit his way out of it — because in Dean's male brain, she comes off as clingy and desperate for his oh-so-smoking body and for a relationship with the most eligible hunting bachelor out there — but Jo puts her foot down and tells him that if he doesn't show up in the next two days, she will hunt him down herself and key his car beyond recognition.

She must have sounded marginally serious, because exactly twenty eight hours later, there he is, Dean Winchester sans Sammy, in all his sweating leather glory, green eyes wide and fists clenched for the impending confrontation, looking every bit like a wet cat on her doorstep.

She grabs his arm and pulls him in, forces him down on the couch and throws him an apprehensive look that has him almost squirming in his seat. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, although she's sure Dean could refute it, considering his trip to Hell a few years ago.

Even though she knows she shouldn't, Jo likes this predicament; almighty Dean Winchester, the man who has slayed demons and angels alike, the man who almost single-handedly ended the Apocalypse and restored the universal balance, cowering in thinly veiled fear in front of Jo Harvelle, the novice hunter who got kidnapped by a creepy ghost on her first hunt, the girl who nobody can seem to take seriously, the tiny blonde with a heart of steel.

She revels in this newfound strength she seems to exude, and she has everything sorted out in her head — how she thinks he's an asshat, how she's not really expecting anything from him but she'll be damned if he shimmies his way out of this while she has to deal with toddlers and diapers and Ellen's I-told-you-so's, how she doesn't care if he has his hands full with playing hero, because hers is one kid that will _not_ grow up without knowing its father.

And it's a damn good speech, really, all ironclad arguments and snarky remarks that hit home, but it goes to waste, because the moment she opens her mouth, her stomach moves just so, and she has to make a run for the bathroom, leaving Dean flabbergasted behind her.

It's only after she can feel her esophagus burn with acidic fluid that she realizes she hasn't even told Dean _why_ he was supposed to haul ass in here like the fires of Hell were licking at his boots in the first place. Though she has a feeling that after witnessing her puke-fest, he has a pretty good idea about what's going on.

She gives him a square look, both of them seated on her bathroom floor, her hair tucked behind her ears and his hands fisted against his knees, and lays out the facts.

"I'm pregnant."

"No shit, Sherlock."

Her eyes narrow and she points an accusative finger at him. "Hey, _you_ don't get to play smart. You put me in this position."

Dean raises an eyebrow and it makes her want to smack him. "Last I checked, it took two to tango, sweetheart."

"But only one ends up pregnant and damned for life, and guess what, it's not _you_ ," she growls, immediately regretting her choice of words because if there is one person who knows all about eternal damnation, then that's Dean Winchester.

However, he takes it in stride and simply snorts. "No, I got that covered back in '08."

But there is no bite in his tone, just this unusual calmness that she has never associated with Dean before. Because Dean is brash and angry and a knucklehead, and he doesn't really abuse this thing he has called brain, and this unnatural serenity about him sends off warning signals in her mind.

"Dean," she starts cautiously.

"Yeah?"

"Aren't you mad?"

He looks confused and so, so much like a kid with those wide green eyes staring at her. "Why would I be mad?"

She shrugs, playing with the hem of her shirt. "Don't know. I'm pregnant. I kind of figured it would piss you off as much as it did me."

"Are _you_ mad?" he asks, and she throws her hands up in exasperation.

"Of course I'm mad! Do you think I _want_ to be pregnant at twenty six?"

"Suppose not," he mumbles and looks away.

And that's the part that really pulls Jo out of her comfort zone. Never mind that they're sitting in the sheltered environment of her current apartment. Never mind that she has the upper hand in the situation because she's the one who got the short end of the stick out of their brief encounter. Never mind that she has prepared and steeled herself against his probable denial and anger. Because this solemn apathy that Dean is emitting is the only thing she _hasn't_ prepared for, and it throws her off balance.

"Do you _want_...?" she asks tentatively, almost inaudibly, lest the higher volume would make the impending answer more terrifying.

Dean still doesn't look at her. She loves this man, she really does, but she doesn't understand him. Even though she has known him for years, even though she has slept with him, even though she has observed and loved him from a distance for as long as she can remember, even though she considers him one of her friends, she still can't figure out how Dean Winchester's mind works.

"Dean," she calls out, one hand diminishing the distance between them and grasping his chin to finally make him look at her.

Green eyes meet brown and that's all she needs to see. It's there, in the bare, unveiled honesty swirling in those two beautiful eyes. Dean has always been an adept liar, but to those who know him, his eyes are a dead giveaway. Some wear their hearts on their sleeves; Dean Winchester wears his in his eyes.

Jo removes her hand so quickly you'd think his skin was lava.

Fucking piece of shit, fate is. This is the only scenario she didn't prepare for and of fucking course this is the one she finds herself in.

"Would it be that bad?" Dean asks quietly.

Her anger kicks in unexpectedly, and if she was a lesser person, she would chalk it up to her pregnancy and the hormones messing up her nervous system, but Jo knows that this blinding rage is hers and hers alone. She scrambles to her feet in a frenzy and sees Dean do the same, albeit in slight apprehension.

"Are you out of your goddamn mind?" Jo yells, but to his credit, Dean doesn't recoil. " _Would it be that bad_? Of course it would be bad! You clearly don't understand what I'm telling you, Dean, because pregnant means baby, and baby means kid, and that means you and me in eternity, squabbling, with a toddler crying in the background! So, yes, it would be _terrible_!"

She has hurt him and she knows it, but the look on his face is hurting her too, and she has to have the upper hand in this, she has to be superior, because if she doesn't, then she will break and it would all have been for nothing.

"Okay," Dean assents. "Look, can we just sit down like civilized people and talk this out?"

Jo huffs. He is making her look immature and insane and she doesn't like that, especially since it's coming from Mr. Paranoid Schizophrenic with Narcissistic Personality Disorder and Religious Psychosis — or so Bobby has told her.

"Fine," she concedes and they find their way back to the worn-out couch, having a staring contest because neither of them quite know how to approach the subject.

Dean looks guarded, but not angry. And that's what she doesn't understand. How can he _not_ be mad? This is rock bottom as far as a hunter's life is concerned, because white picket fences put a stop to the job and both of them know that it doesn't last.

"Okay," she says, tone acute and almost vehement. " _Talk_."

"I..." Dean starts, pauses, runs a hand over his face, and sighs. "What do you want to do?"

 _Real smooth, Dean-o_ , she thinks. _Throwing the hot potato and expecting me to hold it._

"If I already knew that, do you think we would be still having this conversation?"

Dean bristles, obviously trying to fight an upcoming anger explosion. "Fair enough. What are our options?"

"Keeping it or not," Jo says bluntly.

"Jo, work with me on this, please."

"What do you expect me to say? That I expect you to marry me and have a family? That I want us to get into the Impala and ride off towards the sunset? Enlighten me, Dean, so I know how to respond."

"Why are you so aggressive?"

"Because this is out of my control! We fucked up, and now I have to think about the future in a way I never wanted to!" she yells. "I'm a hunter. I never had to think past tomorrow, and now I have to think as far as ten years ahead. Is that so shocking?"

Dean is quiet for a long moment, as if mulling over her words, and Jo watches him expectantly. Deep down, she wants him to wash his hands off of any involvement in this, to tell her that he doesn't want to have anything to do with her or the kid and to dump the load of the decision to her. Because even though she might not know exactly what she wants to do, she knows that she has a better chance of reaching a decision when she only has to confer with herself, instead of having to reach an agreement with this new puzzling Dean.

"I... I don't want to... _not_ keep it."

It takes Jo a moment to deduce the actual meaning of his poorly structured sentence. And even when she does, she's not entirely sure she understands.

"So you want to...?"

Dean's eyes find hers once again, timid in their staring but determined all the same. "I want to keep it."

Jo shakes her head and leans a bit closer, a hundred percent certain that the pregnancy is meddling with her cognitive abilities because this cannot mean what she thinks it does.

"You want to keep it," she repeats slowly, eyes drilled into his face as to not miss any of his micro-expressions. "As in, you want to have a kid. This kid. _My_ kid."

"Our kid," Dean half-supplies, half-corrects, and Jo still doesn't believe she's reading this right, because if he means what she thinks he means then— _no_. She doesn't want to go there.

"What does that exactly entail?" she asks carefully.

Dean leans back in his seat, posture relaxed and calm. The complete opposite of hers, truly.

"I don't know," he says frankly. "I never... You know me, Jo, I don't do relationships. I never have. We're hunters and we know the cost of that."

"But?" she asks, because she can feel it coming from a mile away.

"But we saved the world. We averted the Apocalypse. We ripped up the ending that was in the making for thousands of years and we wrote a new one. And if that doesn't give a man perspective, then I don't know what can."

Jo doesn't understand. Or, maybe she deliberately tries not to, because she has a feeling that the truth is this close to breaking her and she doesn't want that.

"What's yours?"

The brutal honesty is back in his eyes, or maybe it has never left them.

"I want a family, Jo."

And that's when she begins to hyperventilate. It's subtle and very unlike in the movies, but her heart is drumming against her chest and she has to thrust a fist under her nose in order to force her breathing down to normal tempo. Dean just watches, probably debating whether she wants a hug or if she will actually throttle him if he dares to touch her right now.

"What does—what do you _mean_?" she stresses out in between hiccups.

He eyes her carefully. "I've been a hunter all my life. I was always told I couldn't have this kind of... I knew I couldn't settle down and have _this_. But... I _wanted_ it. I didn't even know how much. But then the Apocalypse happened and I realized that free will trumps everything else, even in the grand scheme of things, and damn it, if I want this, then no one can tell me I can't have it."

He moves then, slipping from his seat and standing before her on one knee, his hands grasping the one that's not stuffed against her mouth.

"If you propose to me, Dean, I swear I will fucking—"

"I'm not," he assures her, but it doesn't comfort her at all. "I'm not pushing you into anything, Jo. I want this. I want a kid, but I'm not going to force you to involve me in your life."

Jo stares at him for a brief moment before pushing away from the couch — and from him — and starting to pace the cramped space of the living room.

"This is _not_ how it's supposed to go! You're not supposed to be the one telling me that you can be involved as much as I want you to! You're not supposed to _want_ this! You're not supposed to—"

She stops, both verbally and physically. She turns to look at Dean, still in the same kneeling position, and a terrifying revelation suddenly dawns on her.

"Dean," she begins, over-cautiously. "Do you... _love_ _me_?"

The color that drains from his face is all the answer she needs. It makes a few cracks on the shell of her heart, but it's nothing she hasn't already known and it doesn't bother her quite as much as she would have expected. Dean stands up slowly, buying himself some extra time to formulate an answer, and when he finally stands toe to toe with her, his expression is shy.

"I don't... hate you."

 _It's something_ , she thinks. Not much, but something.

"I liked you enough to have sex with you, after all."

It's the first time since she has laid eyes on him today that she manages to crack a smirk. Dean notices it and probably writes it off in his book of victories.

"One can never be sure with you," she throws back, making his brow crease.

"I like you enough to wanna have a kid with you, Jo, what more proof do you need?"

She pinches the bridge of her nose to collect her strength and sighs. "Okay. Suppose we do this — hypothetically. How do we do it?"

"Well, I thought we could—"

"We can't do this on the road," she cuts him off, only now realizing what she's really asking. "You know our life isn't a life for a kid, because you've been through it. If we do this, we have to do it right. We need a base."

Dean frowns at her, the crease in his brow deepening, and Jo steels herself against the inevitable backlash.

"I _thought_ ," he says emphatically, chiding her previous rude interruption, "We could find a home."

Aaand — cue the waterworks.

It's not like she does it on purpose. She has half a mind to blame it on the unborn child growing in her belly. But it's such an honest, almost childlike, suggestion that, coupled with the fact that it's coming from Dean — Dean, who hasn't known a home since the age of four; Dean, who doesn't know what it's like to have a warm bed of your own to sleep in every night; Dean, whose only notion of home is a '67 Impala — it makes her want to weep.

Dean buffers for a few seconds before assessing the situation before him and wrapping his arms around her wailing form, holding her tight against his chest in what is meant to be a consoling gesture, but which only ends up making her cry harder.

"Hey, hey — it's alright. It's gonna be alright. I'm sorry if I — shit, I didn't mean to hurt you, Jo, I — I'll take it back if you want, just—"

But she's not listening anymore. She is bawling, wetting the front of his shirt and clutching his sides as if her whole life depends on it. She hiccups and snorts and heaves, and Dean just cards his hands through her hair almost awkwardly.

Damn this stupid asshole for not being a stupid asshole for once in his life. Because the Dean she knows is not mature or willing enough to make such a decision. The Dean she knows isn't willing to give up what comes as easily as breathing to him — hunting. The Dean she knows has not had an epiphany because he saved the goddamn world and he certainly doesn't want to be a dad or a husband or a homemaker. The Dean she knows is someone she loves and hates at the same time, and right now she can't even distinguish the feeling squashed between their chests, and if that's not downright terrifying then she doesn't know what is.

It takes her approximately twelve minutes to get a grip and stop bawling. She only knows this because she kept counting the seconds in order to calm down. Dean carefully moves them back to the couch, this time sitting beside her, and his hands fall limply to rest on his thighs as he watches her with thinly veiled concern.

"Better?"

Jo nods, all puffy eyes and a runny nose. She's a far cry from the picture of the independent and self-reliant woman she was presenting when she opened the door to him an hour ago. Has it even been an hour? She glances at her watch curiously; one hour and twenty minutes. Huh. She must have broken a record concerning mood swings somewhere.

Dean catches the motion and asks, "Do you want me to go?"

"No," she says. "We... we have to do this. We need to talk."

"Okay."

"Why do you want to do this?" she asks abruptly. "Why are you willing to quit being a hunter in order to have a family — with me of all people?"

He runs a hand through his hair. "Does it matter?"

"Doesn't it?" she presses. Because she knows that wanting something and knowing why you do are two entirely different things and she suspects that Dean hasn't moved an inch past the first.

"What if you wake up one day and decide this is not what you want? What if you realize that you reasons for doing it weren't solid enough? What happens when you decide to bolt in the middle of the night and I'm left with a kid and a life you convinced me you wanted?"

They are harsh words and she knows it, especially her deliberate use of 'when' instead of 'if'. But this is her life they're talking about — _their_ life. She's not about to leave anything to chance and get so overexcited about Dean's newfound maturity and dreams of a domestic life that she will blinded to reality.

"What if _you_ do?" he asks almost angrily this time, and she's taken aback.

"What?"

"What if you wake up one day and decide to walk out?"

She hopes that she looks positively offended because she definitely feels it. " _Excuse me_? I'm not going to bolt."

"Why not?" he replies immediately, fully on the defensive. "What's stopping you? You're the one who's so indecisive about all this, after all."

"Well, I can't run away from the responsibility of having a kid when I'm the one _carrying_ the kid, you fucking idiot!"

He doesn't even appear fazed. If nothing else, he looks at her like she's the stupid one.

"I'm talking about _after_. After we have the kid and we build something, what stops you from upping and leaving?"

The answer rests on the tip of her tongue; women don't abandon their kids. But even as it formulates in her brain she knows it's not true. And there's a certain truth in what Dean's saying because right now, if she was given the chance to bolt and leave every bit of this behind her, she would. She would take it all back without as much as a second thought. That's the sad little truth.

Her gaze drops on her hands and she quietly mutters, "Nothing."

She hears Dean sigh, and then a hand covers her own. "I'm not telling you that it's going to be easy, Jo. I'm just saying that I want this, and I'm willing to try and make it work if you are. Despite the fact that there's hardly a guarantee that we won't end up killing each other."

Jo smiles at that, because it's the most honest thing either of them has said this evening.

"Yeah, no promises there. You do have a particular knack for making people want to murder you."

Dean mock-glares. "You're not any better yourself, sweetheart."

She pokes her tongue out at him and he smiles in return.

"You alright?"

Jo nods, wiping at her cheeks lest any traitorous tears are still lingering. Her gaze falls down, to the hand still covering hers.

"So... are we doing this? For real?"

Dean looks at her, pausing for a moment, but this time the weight that had become so familiar to her this past hour is not squashing her chest. She waits, holding onto the weight of his hand on her own like it's the only thing grounding her to reality.

In hindsight, it probably is.

"Yeah. I guess we are."

"That's a shitty answer," she tells him, and it would have sounded as a warning if it wasn't for the way her hand shifts so that it's grasping his.

"You'll just have to make do," Dean says.

There's a fluttering in her belly that Jo would like nothing more than to repress, but she can't help but hope that maybe, _maybe_ they won't screw this up too much. Maybe, by some twist of fate, they'll make a functional family together; one that throws Thanksgiving dinners and goes ice-skating on Christmas and fights over the last piece of pie. And maybe Dean will grow to love her the way she already loves him; the way she has for a long, long time.

Or maybe they won't, because fate is cruel and complicated and vicious and unpredictable, and making plans is only going to come back and bite you in the ass one day. Maybe it will turn out entirely different, either bad or good, in a way neither of them expect it to. They'll just have to take it one day at a time, and see where it gets them.

"You're so gonna regret this," Jo says, and the smile that tugs at her mouth is one part hopeful and three parts scared.

Dean laces their fingers together slowly, like it's the most natural thing in the world, and his eyes are searching hers for an answer she doesn't think she has. His own smile reflects the fear that's clearly gnawing at him, too, but she thinks that he looks far surer about this than she ever will.

"So are you."

And maybe they will. But, either way, they'll do it together.


End file.
